45 comments:

Robinson's point about the labeling of the EDL as racist, etc., is well taken. He's absolutely correct that such labeling allows "the powers that be" not to address the points that the EDL is making.

Now, I have my own reservations about the EDL. Call me skeptical. That said, many of those belonging to and supporting the EDL are at the street level -- not living in the ivory towers that politicians enjoy.

Almost immediately after the beheading of Lee Rigby, all the UK papers published articles about the young man's murder. Almost immediately after the articles published, comments to those articles came flooding in -- comments that we, at least in part, relating details of what has happened during the ongoing Islamification of the UK.

Then, guess what? Many of these newspapers closed comments! This closing of comments has further outraged many in the UK.

Because many of today's newspapers have disabled their comments sections, I have decided to open the comments section to this essay. I believe that there are many people out there who want to have their say on this brutal killing. Please, therefore, feel free to comment. Thank you. Mark

Mark's web site gets many visitors every day. However, note the paucity of comments! The result of fear of Muslims, as Tommy Robinson said? I think so.

I was going to add the parable of The camel in the Tent to the comments, AOW, but then realized it deserved to be featured as part of today's post.

I wonder who and how many -- if any -- will understand the connection between Mr. Robinson's situation versus the British Government and the ancient Arabian parable?

Have you ever wondered why the great bulk of Islam's apologists and defenders are political leftists?

How could that element not be aware that the tenets of Islam are dead set against everything the Left purports to stand for?

IF by an ungodly chance SHARIA were to supplant the system of Justice now in place, the leftists would be the very first to be dragged off to be publicly scorned, tortured, mutilated, then decapitated.

How could these deluded individuals not realize that a system of belief whose very name means "SUBMISSION" and whose history reveals conversion to the Muslim "faith" was spread through conquest and the threat of death constitutes the most dire threat imaginable to the rabble rousers, themselves?

Canardo, apparently does not bother to read much if at all, so for his benefit we REPEAT:

Have you ever wondered why the great bulk of Islam's apologists and defenders are political leftists?

How could that element not be aware that the tenets of Islam are dead set against everything the Left purports to stand for?

IF by an ungodly chance SHARIA were to supplant the system of Justice now in place, the leftists would be the very first to be dragged off to be publicly scorned, tortured, mutilated, then decapitated.

Ms Shaw Kenawe contributed this interesting correction (quoted from an official source) to Jack Camwell's, apparently, mistaken assertion that the practice of Christianity is not permitted in Dubai and other parts of The United Arab Emirates:

"According to a ministry report, which collected census data, 76 percent of the total population of the United Arab Emirates is Muslim, 9 percent is Christian, and 15 percent is "other." There is no official recognition of Christian denominations.[3] However, Christians are free to worship and wear religious clothing, if applicable. The importation and sale of religious material is allowed, however, attempts to spread Christianity among Muslims are not permitted. The country has Oriental Orthodox and Eastern Orthodox churches along with Protestant and Roman Catholic churches. The schools in public ownership have no Christian religious education. Christian men are not allowed to marry Muslim women. Conversion from Islam to Christianity is not permitted."

That's all well and good, however, these parts of the statement leapt out at me:

[A]ttempts to spread Christianity among Muslims are not permitted.

The schools in public ownership have no Christian religious education.[Thanks to the machinations of the Left that is true in the USA as well, unfortunately.]

Christian men are not allowed to marry Muslim women.

Conversion from Islam to Christianity is not permitted.

All that really tells us is that in the UAE official anti-Christian, anti-Western policies are only slightly less intense than they are in the rest of the Arab world.

Under this administration, every day something happens which makes you wonder how bad it will get. Sheriff's coming to a home with questionaires and threatening to search because a little boy said the word gun ? Unreal. Does this remind anyone of other dictators in history?Excuse me... Did you just say Gun?Forget all about actual guns, cap guns, guns made from sticks, or even a drawing for a gun. Now, it appears that children can't even say the word "gun" or else risk getting in trouble not only with the school system but also with local law enforcement. That's exactly what happened to an 11-year-old boy who was telling a story and used the word "gun" in it.What’s nest you ask? Don’t ask, watch what you ask, or say, be careful who you're saying it to.After all, this is New America. !

Muslims have been in the US since, at least, the 1880s. Have we experienced a move from Muslims to install sharia law? To "take over" the US? Do Muslim Americans indiscriminately kill their fellow Americans at the same rate or even a greater rate than any other religious group? I don't know the answers to those questions. Are born-and-raised-in-the-USA Muslims more apt to be radicalized than Muslims who have recently immigrated to this country?

According to sources I've read, Muslims have been part of this country since the 1800s. In my lifetime, I have not seen any movement of Muslims to overthrow the US government (but I've heard threats about that from the radical far-right since January 2009, and in the 1960s, from the radical far left.

I do have Muslim friends here and on the west coast, and their hopes and dreams for their families and themselves are no different from mine or my non-Muslim neighbors.

If people believe that the ultimate goal of Islam is to take over the countries they emigrate to, the American Muslims have done a poor job of it.

It is my belief that ignorance--lack of education and opportunity--drives the hate and the allegiance to radical Islam.

I don't know if any research has been done on the Muslims, say, in Britain, and what their level of education is. I'm guessing that the Muslims who have had the opportunity to do better than their parents, grandparents, etc., are less likely to want to overthrow the government in the country where they're succeeding.

As a side note, I'm a nonbeliever, so I have no loyalty to any religion.

How I wish the hypocrites, closet fanatics and wolves in sheep's clothing that lurk among us everywhere were as reasonable and judicious in their thinking as your statement would have them be, Ms Shaw, but I don't believe they are.

As you know, I was born and raised in and around New York City -- by far the most cosmopolitan community in the entire country at the time. I heard as many as eight or ten different languages spoken each day, saw representatives of virtually every ethnic and religious group strolling on the sidewalks and engaging in commerce on many and varied levels.

I've eaten marvelous ethnic food all my life, and have seen many modes of dress peculiar to foreign cultures on the streets, in the parks, banks, shops, museums, theaters, railroad stations and airports -- you name it. I've also been exposed to every form of public entertainment imaginable from Flea Circuses on "naughty, bawdy, tawdry gaudy 42nd Street," to Sammy's Bowery Follies on the Bowery, to Off-Broadway productions of Chekov and many 'experimental" plays and musicals, to Broadway at its best, concerts at Carnegie Hall, Town Hall, the 92nd Street Y, the Old Metropolitan Opera, and everything imaginable, Opera, Ballet, plays, solo recitals, chamber music recitals, and plays at Lincoln Center. To say nothing of the great choral events and organ recitals at St. John the Divine, Riverside Church, St. Bartholomew's, Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, Central Presbyterian Church, "Smokey Mary's," and auditoriums in every conservatory and liberal arts college in Manhattan.

Instead I found it fascinating -- even exhilarating -- UNTIL the Sick-Sties when the Hippies, Sex, Drugs and Rock 'n Roll erupted in our midst, and Woodstock, Whining Folk Song-ridden Protest Gatherings, and Massive Insurrection of Student Bodies all over the country, and Race Riots in the Ghettoes threatened the country with ANARCHY.

I've been what you would be inclined to call radically conservative ever since.

The presence of Muslims here, apparently, was so small and so innocuous between 1880 and 2001, as to be virtually unnoticeable.

It is only since 911, that Muslims have become increasingly vocal and outrageously demanding.

I am honestly astounded that those on the left do not see this sudden emergence of AGGRESSIVE DEMANDS and considerable evidence of VIRULENT HOSTILITY to the point of RITUAL MURDER on the STREETS in broad daylight on the part of Muslims in the West as totally unseemly and out of whack with the standards of decency by which "WE" have tried to live ever since I and my grandparents can remember.

In the wake of an ATROCITY of GREAT MAGNITUDE perpetrated entirely by MUSLIMS the emergence of aggressive, demanding behavior on the part of Muslims certainly DOES seem incredibly callous, ill bred, hostile and yes -- THREATENING.

The followers of Mohammed are known to consider REVENGE of paramount importance, and like the fabled elephant, these people, apparently, never FORGIVE and never FORGET historic grievances and past injustices. Their lust for vengeance only grows stronger with the passage of time -- in some cases many CENTURIES.

The rank and file of ANY group are probably harmless as individuals, but their membership in a group with such a violent history transforms itself into Mob Psychology, better known today as GroupThink, when a charismatic leader stirs the sludge at the bottom of History's Pond with inflammatory rhetoric.

I cannot understand why every member of the Caucasian races in the traditionally Christian West is not united in EXTREME WARINESS.

At the risk of sounding true all I can say is "It's better to be safe than sorry."

And I might as well warn ALL of you now that all references to The Inquisition, The Star Chamber, The Persecution of the Huguenots, The cold-hearted cruelty of John Calvin, Cromwell's Persecutions, the Salem Witch Trials, the Persecution of the Mormons, The Holocaust, and the Ku Klux Klan, will be summarily DELETED.

We already KNOW all that, and it has NO direct bearing on the problems we face today.

Neither by the way does increased acceptance of homosexuality. The Right to Live, Right to Die issues are a different matter. It SHOULD be regarded as significant that the lives of some FIFTY-MILLION human beings were callously extinguished in the womb, but even those morally opprobrious considerations should take a back seat to others of far greater significance.

Your reference to the EDL as "fascism" betrays your own lack of intellectual integrity, Canardo.

Tommy Robinson in England is no more my kind of guy than is Curtis Sliwa of the Guardian Angels, long established here in the good ol' USA, but I would never stoop to calling them names.

I've told you dozens, probably hundreds of times by now that Finger-Pointing, Name-Calling, Libelous Denunciations, Agenda-Driven Selection of "Facts" and "Factoids" thrown into our midst like so many anarchist's bombs does not constitute legitimate debate.

You can call me a "white supremacist" or a "fascist" or a "racist" or a "bigot" all day, and I can call you a "Marxist," a Communist," an "Anarchist," a "Liar," a "Troll," or a "Royal Pain in the Ass," or "Lovely Bright Fellow with a Sadly Misguided Worldview" or whatever, but all of that is, has been and always will be a complete waste of time.

I let you stay, because I do have some respect for you as an individual and for your accomplishments as a photographer, and because I've known you so long I have come to look at you almost as a member of the family -- albeit one who should be kept locked away in The Disappointment Room up in the attic. ;-)

Do you know about "Disappointment Rooms?" I was honestly disturbed to learn of the custom on The Home & Garden Channel not long ago, if you would believe. Almost as chilling as a first encounter with The Lottery (Shirley Jackson).

I don't know if I can relate immigration to the New World to the parable of the camel in the tent, but I'll try.

What motivated people to want to emigrate from their countries of origin over the centuries, from say the 16th Century to the present? Would people who are genuinely happy and content with their life in "the old country" leave behind home and hearth, kith and kin, to get aboard a boat and sail off the edge of the world, into the great unknown? Not if they were not driven by the thought that there was more to life than was experienced in the old country.

If they survived the erratic whims of the of "their betters", the accusations and persecutions of those who endowed themselves with the power and glory of being God's voice and representative incarnate on this Earth, I can understand and relate to their rebellious thinking that there must be a better life ... somewhere.

So they came. They still come. Here's my problem—why would people like that still cling to the culture of the old country that kept them bound in chains or in rags, both psychologically and physically? The strange phenomenon of today in which people come here with an apparent antipathy toward the new "home land", with little apparent interest in becoming part of the new country and its culture and values and maintaining a significant condescending attitude toward toward the inhabitants here, seems more like a treasonous plot hatched by some enemy of humanity on this planet.

"Bill O’Reilly opened his show tonight railing against liberals attempting to belittle or disregard the issue of the Boston Marathon bombers being influenced by radical Islam. O’Reilly claimed that many on the left were “disappointed” the bombing suspects are Muslim, and specifically called out MSNBC’s Alex Wagner for mocking his own coverage by claiming he was just one step removed from accusing President Obama of being a secret Muslim"

Glad to see more people are waking up on this. Our Big Brother is here, and here to stay, until the people have feel it personally. And trust me that say is going soon.This has been a long time in coming, and has been building for even longer. Ever since FDR, we have had the slow slip down the hill to what is ultimately tyranny. Now, BO is abusing the power like all heck, but he didn't make it. He used what everyone else set up. Executive orders were made by someone else. Patriot Act as well. The government interfering with the economy was FDR. Whoever invented SS can be blamed for the health care. And so on. This isn't new. This is old.

Did the other presidents didn't their powers, not really. They knew better. They knew the public wouldn't let them. BO, though, from the start has been untouchable. Why? Well, media loves him. I think he is a puppet, and his puppetmasters have been making him immune. But in any case, no one, in the public or in the government, will challenge him. And he knows it. So, he took the power that was waiting for him, and ran with it. Now that the AP and other branches of the media were affected, perhaps these people will have a change of heart. But don’t hold your breath, I’m still waiting for the media to ask Obama the hard questions.Remember when Obama firat got elected and told his adoring, worshiping supporters that his administration was going to be a “transparent” one! Well that promise didn’t last too long, did it!The frog slowly boils, well, the frog is just about cooked. It isn't starting to boil- its ending. Whatever used to control government corruption is gone now. All three branches had been corrupted long ago, and now we see the fruits of it.The executive does whatever it wants, the legislative banks the E up, and the judicial covers both branches asses. BO has made a critical error though- too much, too fast. The frog is waking up. It isn't quite dead yet. And this sudden burst of heat is alarming. But lets face the truth, if Obama were white or if her was a Republican, he´d never get away with all of this.

I think that the lack of commenters here show that your readers are "a bit pissed off" about your two faced comments. It is not hard to understand that. It was bound to happen eventually. We don"t want or need you faced Conservative bloggers. If you want to comment on a Progressives blog then do so, but don’t go there and butter her up and kiss her behind so that she’ll like you. Eventually she’ll turn on you like the snake she is. Remember AOW... She tried it and she was made to look like a fool (something that she is not).I'm a 55 year old women, who has been around the corner and traveled the world, and I have experienced a lot of things, I am not ignorant, nor am I naive, and if there is one thing in life that I have learned that is NEVER trust a Liberal, especially a Progressive!

Thank you, AA. You understand the parable of The Camel's Nose or The Camel in the Tent. Both names have been used. Interestingly enough its origin is ARABIAN.

As you said, it applies to many insidious, seemingly innocuous things.

The implication is that -- unlike the poor fellow who owned the tent and was so kindhearted as to be unaware that his kindness would eventually get him dispossessed and out in the cold -- we should be forever wary and do our best to consider the ramifications or possible long range consequences before we make any decisions regarding our relationship with others.

Fables, parables, proverbs, fairy tales, etc. are a much more palatable and entertaining way to gain understanding of fundamental truths than ponderous explanations such as the one I have given here. ;-)

However, because of the tremendous deficit in the way we have been teaching children in the past fifty-odd years, most people today are completely unfamiliar with the language of symbolism, allusion, and the use of figures of speech.

We now live in an age of tedious, colorless, dull-witted literalism where few seem able -- or willing even to try -- to understand the simplest analogies, interpret figures of speech, or perceive the subtle nuances of meaning that give writing -- and life, itself, intrigue and vitality.

The concept of allegory seems foreign to most.

As a result, we find ourselves drowning in a sea of minute specifics none of which seem to have any relation to the others.

Thus we do not realize in our endless stupid wrangling ---- over Left and Right -- Foreign and Domestic -- White, Black, Brown -- Religious, Agnostic, Atheist -- Muslims against Christians -- Jews against the rest of the world -- Wealth and Poverty -- Fear of Conquest or lack thereof, ---- that the Common Enemy of every human being is the impulse every one of us has to TYRANNIZE -- i.e. dominate, bully, boss around, control, dictate to, enslave -- OTHERS.

Unless and until every member our benighted-but-also-wondrously-gifted species can learn that lesson well enough to be willing to SACRIFICE himself in its SERVICE, we shall be at each other's throats till Kingdom Come.

Nan, you may be well-meaning, or you may be just another one of a multitude of characters using the privilege of writing anonymously to write derogatory remarks of varying degrees of severity.

I can't be sure, so I let your comment stand, but I assure you that ignorant and naive as you claim, yourself, not to be, your interpretation of my efforts here betray a good deal of both ignorance and naiveté.

My steadfast refusal to regard everyone who challenges -- or even insults -- the views and values I hold dear as "My Mortal Enemy" is a prayerful, thoughtful, ethical, principled, philosophical position I have taken quite deliberately, because I long ago realized that Reality cannot be understood in simple terms of Black and White.

Adamancy, itself, is a kind of sin. Steadfast devotion to one's principles and one's country is one thing. Blind chauvinism is quite another.

"Fundamentalists" of ALL stripes are in fact BLIND CHAUVINISTS. That doesn't mean they are "bad people" necessarily; it only means that they are seeing life in purely ONE DIMENSIONAL terms.

They want everything to be simple, clear, clean, and devoid of confusion and perplexity.

It's NOT, and that would be all there is to it, but for the crying need to understand that at the HEART of EVERYTHING is a Unifying Factor. Call it Love. Call it God. Call it The Source. call it anything you like. Names don't matter, despite all the mumbo jumbo that speaks to the contrary. What DOES matter is that GOD -- i.e. Truth, Principle, Wisdom, Intelligence, Beauty, Love and Life, itself, -- lives and reigns in every part of Creation. Our persistent doubts and denials of this extraordinary, magnificent, awe-inspiring, encouraging, infinitely comforting TRUTH is the only thing that holds us back.

"We can never be sure that the opinion we wish to stifle is a false opinion; and if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still."

In an age of deliberate obfuscation, an age of misdirection and misinformation, distortion and deliberate disinformation to keep the masses confused and misinformed, I would personally applaud anyone who eschews ancient parables and fables and hews to a line of reasoning and pursuit of truth. By keeping the language straight forward and simple making an effort to show and explain an issue or topic by keeping it as simple and straight forward as possible, perhaps it's possible to light a spark of intelligence in another active thinker sometime somewhere.

Gratuitous Displays of Extraneous Knowledge Offered Not To Shed Light Or Enhance the Discussion, But For The Primary Purpose Of Giving An Impression Of Superiority are obnoxiously SELF-AGGRANDIZING, and therefore, Subject to Removal at the Discretion of the Censor-in-Residence.